R. Pitcher Woodward (1866 - 1941)

Robertson Pitcher Woodward was a Brooklyn Eagle journalist. He was so confident that Williams Jennings Bryan would defeat William McKinley in the presidential election of 1896 that he made a highly unusual wager with a Benjamin Lillard of Popular Science News - If Jennings won, Woodward would pocket $5,000. If Jennings lost, Woodward would pay the $5,000 or procure a donkey and, without a dollar in his pocket, ride it across the United States in one year’s time. As one can guess, Woodward chose the latter. He lit out for the territory ahead atop a trusty steed named Macaroni. The pair traveled 4096 miles, making it to the Palace Hotel in San Francisco with only twenty-two hours to spare. His picaresque adventures were serialized in the Brooklyn Eagle under his pen name “Pythagoras Pod,” and then recounted in his 1902 book, “On a Donkey’s Hurricane Deck.”